There are many
styles of martial arts around the world that incorporate techniques for what
could technically be referred to cognitive dissociationunder the
stress of a fight by means of strong association with an animal or spirit.

What this means in
simple terms is that when the practitioner fights, they undergo a mental
change from being themselves to being someone (or something) else.

Various styles from
around the world including African arts, Kung Fu, Kuntao and Silat teach these
forms of cognitive transformation. Often they are believed to be magical
in nature due to their effectiveness in combat, and their transmission is thus
cloaked in the mythology, religion, and superstitions of their culture.

Besides, what else
couldyou call something like this back in the day other than
magic?

These are literally
ways by which a man becomes an animal! But instead of the European werewolf
they are becoming a Chinese tiger, a Javanese monkey spirit, or an African
incarnation of the crocodile god.

Now, before we go
further, no these people are notphysically growing
claws and fangs and scales and tails! They might think they are, but that's a
different story...

What's happening is
that these people are losing sense of selfand associating into
these other mental states as a way to deal with the stress of combat.

Where a man may be
afraid, a tiger is not...

Now, some level of
dissociation during combat is common to all cultures. People commonly report
how "they saw themselves fighting" or say "it was like watching a movie" or that
"it was like being someone else". These are allsigns of
dissociation and taken as a normal part of the fighting experience.

In many ways, a
dissociated state can be beneficial for combat because it can help to manage
fear and allow survival behaviors beyond those normally acceptable in society.

But these styles
where they are "becoming" the tiger it is beyond mere dissociation and into an
actual association with these powerful archetypes. By associating so strongly
with these powerful figures and "being them" rather than ones self it creates a
mental place where the practitioner moves beyond their normally conceived limits
and acts truly "as if" they were this other person.

If this all sounds
a little far fetched, take the recent case of the 5-year-old Spiderman in Brazil
that I saw in the paper. Here's this little kid and he's real into Spiderman.
He's out playing Spiderman with his friends and they see smoke coming from a
neighbors house, so he runs and tells her. And the woman is so afraid to go in
because of the fire that she is hesitant to go in and get her baby who is asleep
in his crib.

So, this 5-yer-old
kid just runs into the burning house on his own and saves the infant.

Wow! Why would a
little kid do that? Well, partly because he was too young to have a sense of
the danger, but more over because it's exactly what Spiderman would have
done.

You see, in his
associated state of being Spiderman it was congruous behavior for him.
Spiderman would not have stood there, right? He would take action! This kid
was so "not himself" (dissociated) and sofully associated into
this other character that having the bravery to run into a burning building and
save a baby was "just natural" to him.

This exact same
"Spiderman Effect" is what's happening in the minds of martial artists. They
become so associated into the animal or spirit in question that it enables them
to act accordingly.

The rituals by
which these mental states are changed can in essence be reduced to a series of
resource state anchors used to bring on this dissociated /
trans-associative state. The new associative personality is in this case the
resource state, and the ritual the trigger by which it is activated. Perhaps in
a future Training Tip we will deal with the issue of creating and anchoring
resource states in detail.

The point in this
article is not to break down the exact process of any specific tradition or
technique that is taught. That would be unfair to any of these martial styles
in question. These kinds of techniques are almost universally guarded teachings
and closely linked to larger parts of a style's belief structure. So, to walk
in with the modern cognitive sciences in an attempt to explain it might be
considered offensive even if that is not the intent.

If anything, I hope
this article will get more people interested in aspects of martial arts training
beyond the physical. Personally, I don't feel this kind of scientific analysis
detracts from the arts in question in any way. The intent is not to ridicule
them for being outdated but instead to examine the underpinnings of these
historical techniques through the filter of modern cognitive studies.

In the end, I feel
the modern science explaining such techniques only gives credit to the old
masters for being ahead of their time in developing working
strategies to deal with the issues they faced.